I didn't find a seed source but I certainly did find something interesting about this variety, or what I thought was a tomato variety.

The variety is listed in the SSE 09 Yearbook as Coeur de Boufe de Nice, seed source an SSE member from France and is described as a 4-6 oz red pear.

Then I looked at Tania's site and she lists a Coeur de Boufe Orange and says seed source an individual in France and shows a heart shaped variety.

Then I googled it and found a couple of sites that showed pictures, one from Italy with the variety name written on the side of a carton of fruits that were large red pleated pear shaped fruits.

Another site showed the same large pear shaped pleated fruits.

None of the above are places where seeds can be purchased.

But what surprised me is that the pictures of the large red pleated ones that were pears were the same pictures that appeared at a couple of commercial sites this Spring that IDed them as Cuor di Bui, which is a red heart shaped variety from Italy, but that was obviouly wrong b/c Cour di Bui IS heart shaped but what was shown in the picture was that large red pleated pear, and clearly not a heart.

Cuore, cuor, coeur all mean heart, and boufe, beauf, etc, all mean heart.

So what we're talking about here is a variety or varieties called Heart of the Bull in different languages and often spelled differently.

I've got a great one called Serdtse Buivola, which is called Heart of the Buffalo. LOL

Anyway, I find no place that sells seeds of the variety you're looking for and would suggest that there's lots of confusion even about the name as you can see from what I've written.

So please do ask your friend where she or he heard about it and what he or she expected to find; a red heart or a red pear shaped tomato.

In either case there are lots of other good choices for red hearts and large red pears and I can direct you to one of the sites that lists Cuor di Bui, wrongly, and the picture is the same as that shown for the Coeur de Boufe.

At least I tried.

Carolyn

Thank you for all the info.

I think he said he heard about / ate it in Europe.

The translation you provided will help alot.

Nam

Oxheart aka Cuor di bue. pinkish color...fleshy, not too many seeds great for eating and cooking. We've been growing them for years and are always satisfied with their production and flavor. Seeds can be found at Seeds from Italy....growitalian.com

Here is a link that might be useful: Seeds from Italy - Oxheart Page

This is indeed a tomato variety and I have a source for these seeds for you, Consorio Agrario Parma. I just got them in Tuscany, as a gift, after raving about these tomatoes. Ask for pomodoro cuor di bue. The web address is seme@consorzioagrarioparma.it. Good luck.

I'm cutting and pasting the information below from another site b'c it has some important information in it.

To wit, those in Italy now don't distinguish between the variety Cuore di Bue, which is a red hart shaped variety and the larger red pear varieties that have various names as indicated in what I cut and pasted below, and this has led to huge confusion and wrongly IDed varieties here in the US from imported Italian seed.

So there's really no need to get seeds from Italy, depending on what you want namfon.

If you want the red oxheart Cuore di Bue, then go to Grow Italian as suggested above. Bill gets all of his seed from Franchi, in italy and that seed company is 256 years old.

If you want the much larger red pear, that has a shape opposite to a heart shaped variety, then I can suggest several places here in the US that have them. As I recall Bill also has a large red pear one at his Grow Italian site.

but I thought what I cut and pasted below might be useful reading for those interested. It's part of a long thread on italian tomato varieties, but it's against GW guidelines to refer to another website by name, since a person can be banned for doing so, I so I won't.

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I'm definitely not an expert, but being Italian, and living in Torino (less than 100 miles from Liguria, Albenga and Cuneo) maybe my point of view could be of help.
As you already know, Albenga is a town in Liguria region, on the seaside, which is well known for tomatoes.
Cuneo is another town, not far, in the southern Piemonte region (with a bit colder climate), but i never heard anything special about tomatoes from there.
"Cuore di bue" (this is the correct spelling) simply means "ox hearth", and it is the label under which go 99% of all the hearth shaped, or pear shaped, or boat shaped tomatoes which are sold in Italy: maybe long time ago "cuore di bue" was a variety, but now there are dozens of varieties, both hybrid and OP, which go under that label (as you can see here: http://www.actahort.org/members/show...knrarnr=807_22 or, more extensively, but in italian, here: http://www.venetoagricoltura.org/upl...E_IV_CV_PV.pdf )
Albenga and Liguria are often used as "sublabels", added to the general "cuore di bue" label, to identify tomatoes grown in the nothwestern part of Italy, which are generally pear shaped.
As for seeds to try, I have some saved from "Albenga" tomatoes that I bought on the market (gorgeous, and delicious, and quite pricey; i should also have some pictures, somewhere), and some commercially sold here as "cuor di ponente" (ponente being western part of Liguria); I didnt plant any of them this year, maybe next year, but in any case I will have some to spare, so let me know if you are interested.

Carolyn

Carolyn,

I'm interested in this as well. On a recent trip to France, all of the Parisian Fresh Markets had what they called Coer de Boufe tomatos but they looked like this:

I've been trying to find seeds ever since. Didn't even see them while browsing in France. But every market had them.

They were beautiful, but definately not a heart. I'd love it if someone found a source.

Susan

The tomato very well may be the Tomato Costoluto. These are very beefy tomatoes full of acidity intense flavor, great for sauces. They are available from growitalian but also park seeds and various other sources.

"Costoluto" again is not a variety just as "ox heart" is not a single variety. But there is a famous Costoluto called "Costoluto Genoves " (spl ?). Its seeds is widely available.